


Interface Integration

by theLoyalRoyalGuard



Series: Dual Process Theory [4]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Anything can be a sex toy if you believe in yourself (and electrical engineering), Intimacy, M/M, Mutual maintenance to mutual pleasure, Non-Graphic Smut, POV Cassian Andor, POV K-2SO, Physical Disability, Robot Feels, Robot/Human Relationships, wireplay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-24
Updated: 2019-05-24
Packaged: 2020-03-09 09:52:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18914560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theLoyalRoyalGuard/pseuds/theLoyalRoyalGuard
Summary: Kay and Cassian experiment with new forms of physical intimacy made possible by Cassian's spinal implants - because for once what didn't kill him brought him closer to the one he loves.





	Interface Integration

**Author's Note:**

> Special thanks to ant.chan for the beta, and to Bright_Elen, for always cheering me on, and being a wonderful ship captain and friend <3

It’s something of a surprise to K-2SO to discover how much he enjoys physical contact with Cassian Andor. Not that it happened suddenly, on the contrary, it snuck up on him over time. Retrospectively, he’s taken to collecting the myriad flashes of memory stored in his hard drives and collating them into a database of touch and response. Most of the early ones aren’t particularly notable, and fall into two categories: Cassian maintaining him, and him maintaining Cassian.

_A1. Cassian buffing scuff marks out of his plating, lower lip caught between his teeth, hands steady on the buffer. He’s younger, skin smoother, facial hair sparser. The buffer is a vague vibration neither pleasant nor unpleasant, but it’s Cassian’s attention he appreciates. Most people would just hand off a droid to a mechanic, or not bother with superficial damage at all._

_A67. Cassian in a safe house, cleaning grime from the small ring joints of his digits, his shoulders relaxing as he concentrates. There’s blood and dust matted in his hair, but he made sure to wash his hands before touching Kay._

_B24. Kay carrying Cassian back to their ship, one of his arms around Kay’s neck, cheek pressed against durasteel plating. The moon is cold, Cassian sick and shivering, so he runs his internal systems hotter to warm him. On their ship, he makes sure Cassian hydrates, and tucks him into his bunk. He lingers on the pretense of checking Cassian’s pulse._

_B45. Kay is grateful for the dexterity of his hands, even if hates the water. Wearing gloves to his elbows to protect him as he leans into the fresher, fingers in Cassian’s hair to wash it. Cassian sitting with his bandaged hands in his lap, eyes closed, leaning back into Kay’s touch in perfect trust._

He’s not entirely sure, but Kay thinks it’s around B45 that he began to realize how much Cassian craves contact. Previously, he’d noticed that Cassian used touch as one of his many tools to set a mark at ease, make himself appear friendly; or, conversely, to intimidate or exert power over other kinds of marks. It didn’t occur to him until later that he might want it for himself, and not only as a tool.

And it didn’t occur to him until much later that Kay himself could be the one to give it.

He’d assumed, for a long time, that only another organic could satisfy that need.

He knows better, now.

The problem is, intimacy is a prickly subject in many organic cultures, sex even more so. Sex with droids is a taboo at best, something that certainly happens, but most people don’t want to acknowledge. 

And yet. Here they are. Cassian has voluntarily initiated and encouraged intimate physical contact. It was his idea to start kissing the finely calibrated sensors on Kay’s hands in the first place. Which is what he’s doing now, what set off this particular set of processes and involuntarily retrieved memories. The particular softness of his lips, the warm moisture of his breath condensing on metal, everything that makes up the feel of him is…

Unique. Wonderful. His touch produces data along the same lines as witnessing the glories of a nebula in the darkness of space. 

But he’s never asked for more than this, and never offered, either. Even though Kay can tell this sort of contact arouses him, Cassian never asks.

So Kay does.

Sort of.

“Cassian?”

“Mmm.”

“Do you self-stimulate?”

“Not... “ Cassian lifts his head from Kay’s hand, going an unusual shade of red. It’s quite amusing, as is his sheepish tone. “Not really.”

“Why not?” Kay shifts so Cassian can sit up. They’re on the sofa, because that’s the easiest place for them to do this, where Kay can lean back and Cassian can lean on him. “I have read it reduces stress and promotes immune system function in many species of organics, including humans.”

“I guess I haven’t really been in the mood.” Cassian shrugs and shifts away. That isn’t what Kay had wanted to happen at all.

There could be several reasons for Cassian’s lack of interest. He experiences arousal, but maybe he doesn’t like sex. Maybe he has a history with it he doesn’t want to engage with. There are missions, after all, that he took that even Kay doesn’t know the details of. 

The not knowing is a problem. Kay doesn’t like not knowing things, missing data vital to reaching a conclusive result. If Cassian doesn’t want sex, that’s fine. Kay is curious, but it’s hardly a necessity. But if Cassian does want it, well, Kay’s not about to let them miss out just because neither of them want to bring it up.

“Perhaps I can help.”

“No!” Cassian’s head jerks up, alarmed, setting off a streak of unpleasant processes Kay has learned organic terms for like anxiety. “No. Thank you. We are not having– doing that for my health.”

“What would you do it for, then?” Kay attempts to remain calm. Rational.

“You’d have to enjoy it. Not just reducing my stress. All of it. And you have no reason to…”

The data is increasingly in favor of Cassian wanting it, and abstaining because he’s being noble and thinks it’s best for Kay. Endearing, but ultimately counterproductive. Still, it’s something Kay can work with, and of the probabilities he’d considered, it’s probably the least concerning. “I would like to point out that I have no reason to enjoy touching you in other ways, and yet, I do.”

“It’s not like physical therapy, it means more, it would have to.”

“Yes, organics have very particular ideas and customs around mutual stimulation, but I am not organic. I enjoy touching you, and when you kiss me. It is also important to me to promote your health.”

“Kay…” Cassian sighs, gaze dropping to the floor. “I’d want it to mean more.”

“I am not certain what you mean by more. If I dislike it, or you do, we don’t have to do it again.” Because he doesn’t know the source of Cassian’s discomfort, he adds, “and if you dislike the idea entirely, I won’t mention it again.”

“Kay, you… you don’t like it when I bleed on you. You find organic fluids unpleasant, and there are, well, sex is generally a bit wet.” He’s blushing again. If he’s only hesitating out of embarrassment, that seems easy enough to resolve. But with Cassian, nothing is ever simple or easy. It is one of the ways they are very different. 

“I am aware,” Kay replies, rather smug. “I asked Bodhi. He said there are ways to avoid fluids.” He reaches for Cassian’s arm. “Come back? Explain to me what ‘more’ is.”

~~~

‘More’ is Cassian’s need for certainty that Kay isn’t just doing something purely for him. For his health. For… data gathering. ‘More’ is how much Cassian craves Kay’s touch, and the guilt he feels for dreaming of him, the confusion every time kissing Kay’s hands arouses him.

‘More’ is his yearning to give something back, and not knowing how. He knows what he gets from kissing Kay, from the caress of gentle hands on his skin. He knows what he could do for organic lovers, but not a synthetic one. A droid built for fighting, beautiful and graceful and hypnotically powerful, but not built to share the experience Cassian wants to share with him.

‘More’ is sharing something with Kay that the droid isn’t programmed to even truly understand. 

He does his best to explain, though he’s not sure his best is very good, because Kay doesn’t seem to have a problem with it. And if he understood, he would have a problem with it. 

Wouldn’t he?

Well, it is Kay. He might not. Cassian has to bear in mind the warning Bodhi gave him about making decisions based on what _he_ thinks is best for his partner. 

Kay’s insistence that he likes touching Cassian, that yes, he does enjoy it, and “just because I don’t enjoy it the same way you do doesn’t mean it isn’t real,” erodes his doubts. 

“Cassian, you have to stop trying to equate your feelings with mine.”

“I know, I know.” He kisses the curve of Kay’s neck well, and whispers a piece of the deeper truth, beneath the protests that are so much easier to say. “I’m not very good at this. It… frightens me, how much I want you. I don’t know how this works.”

“We will figure it out, all of it.” Kay’s huge hand curves around his shoulder. 

“What’s the probability?” 

“One hundred percent, so long as you don’t stop trying.”

Cassian takes a deep breath, holds it for a count of five, and lets it ease out of him again. Just thinking about what he’s about to say makes his pulse spike. If they’re going to figure it out, he might as well start now. “You can undress me. Touch me however you want, except…”

Kay’s optics flick up, meet his gaze and hold it. “Yes?”

“Don’t touch me here. Or here.” He indicates below his belt with a hand that doesn’t – quite – shake. “Not yet. Anything else is fine. I… I might get turned on.”

“Yes,” Kay says again, in a very different tone. “That is the point. I have run several simulations on what I think is most likely to arouse you physically.”

For some reason, that alone makes his breath catch. That Kay has been thinking about it maybe as much as he has, and in a way that is perfectly… him. He slides his hand up under Cassian’s shirt, spreading fingers and palm over his stomach and chest. Cassian grabs his free hand and brings it to his lips again, to kiss something Kay can feel. 

“That is pleasant.” Kay’s voice is as even as before, but his touch is intimate, tender, as he lifts Cassian’s shirt over his head and lays it neatly over the arm of the sofa. Cassian shifts until he’s kneeling in Kay’s lap, knees on either side of the struts that make Kay’s thighs. Most of the droid’s height is in his legs, so they’re even like this. He can look into the cool white glow of Kay’s optics as one metal fingertip traces the shape of his lips. 

They’ve hardly done anything, and his heart is already racing. 

Kay has seen him undressed before, touched him plenty of times. They’ve been kissing and cuddling for months. Still, this is different. There’s new intention behind it. 

Or maybe not so new. Everything in the way Kay touches him is deliberate, thought-out by a computer mind designed for strategy. 

He’s been so caught up in denying his own desire, he couldn’t even see his partner’s. The revelation steals his breath. 

“Oh.” It comes out a whisper as metal fingers drag through his hair, down his spine, to the place where flesh becomes biosteel. He shivers as Kay traces the arch of his hip bone and trails down his thigh, muscle jumping under his skin even with the cloth still between them. He sucks in air, a ragged gasp.

“Is that good?” Kay asks, pausing.

“Yes. Don’t stop.” He drags his lips down one of Kay’s fingers, enjoying the smooth texture. He’s used to the smell and taste of steel by now, and while he didn’t mind it at first, he’s coming to like it. For the first time, he lets the tip of his tongue flick over one of the sensors in the end of Kay’s thumb.

The droid makes an odd humming noise he’s never heard before. 

“Was that all right?” He stops, pulls back in case Kay didn’t like it.

“It is… interesting. I would like you to do again, but my hands are not clean. You should allow me to wash them before putting them in your mouth.”

Cassian laughs, softly, a little hoarse. “I’ve had worse things in my mouth and I’m still here.”

“And who do you have to thank for that?” Kay asks, and simply lifts him off his lap to deposit him on the sofa. Disappointment floods through Cassian without the contact as Kay’s weight lifts off the cushions. 

He closes his eyes and takes another deep, steadying breath. This is okay. This is good. He follows the path Kay’s hand took over his hip and down with his own, surprised by how turned on he is already. 

Kay returns with a whir of servos and the faint smell of antiseptic. Settling next to Cassian, he picks him up again, returning him to his place in Kay’s lap. “There. Now my hands are clean.” 

He places his thumb over Cassian’s lips again, an invitation so plain he can’t doubt it. “Tell me what feels good,” he says, and he’s relieved, so relieved, to find any way Kay likes it. There’s something about knowing the pure intellectual power of Kay’s processors is focused entirely on him and his pleasure that is thrilling. No doubt about that. But he struggles to give up control and the need to do _something_ in return. 

He’s hard, and gets harder as he mouths Kay’s fingers and Kay makes low humming sounds, but with the rules he put in place, there’s no way he’s going to finish like this. Which is good. He’s not ready for that yet, and he doesn’t know when he will be. Not when he’s so easy to please by comparison, and knows so little of what to do for his partner. He runs his hands over Kay’s chassis, but the droid lacks all the sensitive places he’d look for on an organic. 

“I can’t feel that,” Kay reminds him several times, and when he slides his fingers over and through the ring joints of Kay’s arms, he says, “you are going to get pinched if you do that.” 

“Where do you have sensors I can touch?” he asks finally, aching and longing. 

“I like when you press your body against my chassis. It is very pleasant.”

Which explains why Kay likes cuddling, but doesn’t help him right now. Meanwhile he’s aroused and frustrated, and when he can’t take it anymore, he kisses Kay’s palm hard and says, “I’ll be right back.”

Alone, in the ‘fresher with the warm water pouring over him, he can finally finish, imagining it’s Kay’s hands on him and in his hair and sure it’s never going to happen. It’s messy and unflattering and worst of all something he can’t do for Kay in return. 

~~~

It takes three months before Cassian will come in front of Kay. He’s shy about it, says he doesn’t really want that to be part of Kay’s dataset. 

They’d taken to spreading a towel over Kay’s lap and abdominal section, just in case, and this time when Cassian moves to get up, Kay catches his wrist.

“I would like it if you stayed.”

He always has to phrase these things carefully, in such a way that Cassian can be sure Kay actually wants something, and isn’t just humoring him. As if Kay has ever just humored him about anything in all the years they’ve known each other. Sexual encounters with Cassian are an exercise in vocal control he’s never had to deal with before - or never cared enough to bother - but he’s always telling the truth, and that’s enough for both of them. 

Cassian’s naked in his lap, which alone took nearly two months for him to allow. He’s let Kay touch his genitals, though he went an alarming shade of pink the first time and Kay thought he was going to hyperventilate. But he still hasn’t come outside the privacy of the shower, and Kay hates having things withheld from him. He hates incomplete data; it grinds in his circuits like sand in his servos. And he’s not a patient droid. He doesn’t like waiting.

He’s been extremely patient, as far as he’s concerned.

In his hand, Cassian’s pulse races under his fingers, hot and strong. He smells different, too, a unique combination of chemicals Kay now has extremely positive association with. 

“You’re sure?” he rasps, and Kay nods.

“I would not say it otherwise.” He laces his fingers through Cassian’s hair, then lets them trail down his back, slowly, contemplating the exact temperature and texture of his skin, the lines of his scars, the shiver of breath in his ribcage. 

“Kay,” Cassian whispers, in a tone Kay only gets to hear like in moments like this, rough and desperate. 

“When you reach orgasm in the shower, do you think about me?” Kay asks. It’s something he’s been wondering and now, distracted by Cassian’s heat, it slips out.

“Yes.”

Cassian must be nearly gone if he’s answering so promptly. Not one to let an advantage slip by, Kay presses him. “Tell me.” 

He does, or tries, in increasingly broken sentences, and Kay takes meticulous notes of each fantasy for later consideration. 

~~~

Kay was extremely pleased when Cassian got him the schematics for the bionic implants that let him walk and run without (much) pain. He suspects that, as usual, Cassian downplays whatever discomfort he still experiences, although not as often as he used to. At least, or maybe especially, around Kay himself. In the droid’s opinion, it’s a development in both Cassian’s relationship with himself, and theirs with each other.

He is especially pleased with theirs. 

He understands that, for Cassian, intimacy is a minefield he’s spent his life avoiding rather than exploring. For all the time it’s taken for Cassian to become comfortable with his desires, their explorations have been extremely rewarding. Kay’s datasets on him, for example, have expanded more than he’d even thought possible.

Kay thinks a lot about Cassian’s objections, first to sexual touch, and then especially to allowing Kay to witness his climax. One night’s whispered confession sticks with Kay, made half asleep in the dark, that Cassian is uncomfortable not for himself, but because it’s not something he can give Kay in return. Kay is made to solve problems, and latches on to this one with all the tenacity of his favorite programming.

The real problem is Cassian’s sense of inadequacy, or perhaps of fundamental fairness, that he shouldn’t have what he can’t give back. Kay doesn’t know how to explain any more clearly that Cassian needs to stop thinking that only his human understanding of pleasure and satisfaction are the goals Kay should aim to experience.

He doesn’t know how to explain what he feels when he holds Cassian, feels his heat, detects the particular unique mix of chemicals that signal his physical pleasure. He doesn’t know how to tell him about the surge of energy that devours his processes when Cassian trusts him so utterly, or the satisfaction of holding his limp, warm body and seeing such bliss and peace in his face that he shows only in those few unguarded moments after climax.

Phrases like “closing a circuit” and “completing a dataset” are as dry and meaningless to Cassian as the human’s attempts to explain what he feels are wet and confusing to Kay.

It is a difference they have to accept.

So, in the depths of his computer mind, Kay continues to analyze the problem. That is, after all, what he does best. He collects information, organizes it, and finds the best possible solutions.

And, slowly, Cassian does accept the difference. He believes when Kay says he truly enjoys this new aspect of their relationship. It is enough. More than enough. It is good. 

Wet, yes. Perhaps slightly unflattering. But very, very good.

In the meantime, Kay downloads and explores the schematics for the bionic implants in Cassian’s spine. The implant has a single charging port that doubles as a maintenance plug-in, and rather than Cassian going to the clinic every time he needs an adjustment, Kay decides to do it himself.

“I’m much better at it,” he declares smugly as they end a session. And besides, he likes doing the kind of work on Cassian that the human has done for him for years. Sharing droid-intimacy with him. “I know you better than they do, and this design is very interesting. I am reasonably impressed that organics invented it. They must have had synthetic help.”

Cassian snorts. “Organics invented droids.”

“And early droids helped perfect the designs of more advanced machines. Turn around.” 

His dataspike had turned out to be too big, and the wrong kind of connector, for the specialized port at the base of Cassian’s spine. On a shopping trip with Bodhi, he bought a smaller two-bit adapter attachment. 

The routine mechanical maintenance Cassian performed on him for years takes on new shape these days as mutual care. As intimate as sex – to Kay, perhaps even more so. 

They’re settled on the sofa, Cassian sitting with his back to Kay and his shirt tossed haphazardly away, Kay bent over him. He keeps his right hand curled out of the way of the ‘spike plugged into the bionic, flickers of data blending with the warmth of Cassian’s skin, the familiar scent of his chemical signature. Cassian holds perfectly still, except for the soft movement of his relaxed breathing. 

His back is streaked with a few faint scars, marks of wear and tear like the ones that score Kay’s chassis. From just beneath Cassian’s ribs to the jointure of his pelvis, the soft brown skin parts to show metallic blue bones. Kay likes the blue; it was his idea, after all, and he still thinks it’s a very good color for Cassian. He traces the tip of his left index finger along the seam where metal and skin meet.

“Kay…” Cassian shivers delicately, his voice soft and a little hoarse.

“I had a thought.” Kay retracts the attachment so Cassian can move safely. Excitement tumbles out of him as a solution to his calculations finally falls into place. “The electrical impulses of your nervous system are routed through the bionic implants. If I plug in while you are experiencing sexual pleasure and orgasm, I may be able to read that input. I would enjoy that, if you’re interested.”

Cassian twists to look over his shoulder, his pulse fluttering a little faster in the hollow beneath his jaw, a faint shadow not quite concealed by skin color and facial hair. At least, not concealed from Kay. That tell-tale little sign gives Kay more information than Cassian’s expression, which is carefully neutral.

His voice, however, betrays hope. “You’d enjoy it scientifically, or sexually?”

Kay nods. “Both.”

“I… should have expected that.”

“Yes.”

There’s a pause, several agonizing seconds that give Kay more than enough time to run scenarios based on the many possibilities of what Cassian might say next. He has tasted the complex patterns of Cassian’s nervous system, a veritable feast of energy and information, and he wants more. 

For perhaps the first time, he thinks he really understands the ache of desire that, in the rare beautiful moments just before Cassian lets go, drives him blissfully mad. 

Or maybe he just wants to understand, and he thinks this is the way. This is the link between them; they are united by the electricity that runs through them both. Wires and nerves aren’t so different. 

Now, with the port and the attachment, they finally have a way to interface. 

And Kay _wants_ it.

“Do you want to try it now?” Cassian asks, and relief rushes through Kay like the sweet coolness of ventilation. 

“Yes.”

Cassian nods without a fuss, and gets up. He’s usually a little unsteady right after recalibration, and weaves slightly going into the ‘fresher. Or maybe that’s not the only reason he’s weaving. When he comes out with the condom packet in his hand, there’s already a small but distinct rise in the front of his trousers.

“Are you aroused already?” Kay asks, and he starts out teasing, but changes tactics as another piece of information fills in the sarcastic _you humans are so easy_ comment with, “Because you’re thinking about pleasing me?”

A warm flush brightens the heat signature in Cassian’s face. He pauses, glancing down at himself as if he could possibly have not noticed, as if he’s going to try to feign surprise, but then he just nods again. 

“Yeah. I… I’ve wanted to for a long time.” He finishes closing the distance between them, and climbs into Kay’s lap. 

He’s a warm, comforting weight when he leans against Kay’s chassis, heat seeping into durasteel as he wraps his arms around Kay’s neck. He can’t feel Cassian’s lips on his faceplate, but for a moment the scent of his skin and the dark nebulas of his eyes fill Kay’s sensory receptors. He’s all light and heat and chemical and he’s _beautiful_ in a way that scrambles the orderly cascade of Kay’s code and makes his automatic ventilation kick on to keep his inner workings at optimal temperature.

Kay rakes his fingers through Cassian’s hair, tugging hard enough to pull his head back, and Cassian gasps a low, ragged inhalation. His hips kick forward in a movement Kay likes, because he knows humans can’t help it. A movement that means he’s doing a good job. He runs his hand down the warm plane of Cassian’s back, over scapula and ribs and the hard nodes of his vertebrae, setting off another rush of pleasing sensory data. Warmth, texture, variety of densities. 

His other hand, independently, moves to tug Cassian’s trousers down his hips. It’s still new Cassian lets him do that, and he revels just a little in being able to. Maybe there’s a small part of him that enjoys breaking the cultural taboo that says they shouldn’t. Since leaving the Empire, Kay enjoys doing things he shouldn’t.

“Tell me when you are aroused enough for the next step,” Kay says, and the limitations of his vocabulator cannot convey what he is feeling.

“What’s the next step?” Cassian asks, and by contrast, his traitorous human vocal folds betray a great deal. Trepidation, excitement, and most of all, lust.

“I think it would be easiest if you sit in my lap. You will have to have your back to me, which is unfortunate, because I like to see your face.”

“Because I make funny expressions?” Cassian sits back on Kay’s knees and opens the condom packet. 

“Because I like it,” Kay reasserts, watching him roll the condom on. He doesn’t mind that Cassian isn’t ready to be touched there yet. It’s not the part of him that Kay’s most interested in. It holds none of the significance to him it would to another organic. And it gets wet.

“Keep your secrets, then.” Cassian drags his nails lightly down his own chest, then slides back up pinch one of his nipples. 

“Wait.” Kay touches the back of his hand before it can make the return journey or reach his erection, stilling without stopping him. “I want to feel it from the beginning. And we should make sure you’re comfortable before you’re too turned on. You get reckless when you’re impatient.”

“Hm. That’s a good point, though. I’m going to have to stay pretty still while you’re plugged in.” He has his thinking face on, sizing up the situation, planning out how it will go. A lot like Kay’s own simulations, so he privately believes. Then he nods as he comes to a decision.

It takes a little maneuvering before he’s comfortable, settled straddling the struts of Kay’s thighs. Kay reaches around and brushes his fingers over Cassian’s mouth, a soft invitation, and Cassian meets it with enthusiasm. He doesn’t need to see what he’s doing to fully enjoy the softness of organic lips with deepening kisses, then the damp heat of his tongue, the thrill of the hard edges of teeth that bring an appreciative hum from his vocoder.

He doesn’t need to see Cassian’s face to feel him smile at that. 

“I’m ready for the next step,” Cassian rasps against the two metal fingers pressed to his mouth. 

“Hold still,” Kay says, and pulls his hand away to extend the dataspike and replace the attachment to its tip. Cassian settles a little more of his weight onto Kay’s thighs, and then goes quiet, holding even his breath. 

Gently, with all the tenderness he learned from Cassian in all the years the human cared for him, Kay fits the bit into the small port and lets brilliant flares of organic electrical pulses light up inside him. 

“You can touch yourself now.”

Cassian lets out his breath in a ragged sigh, shoulder shifting into position. His heartbeat is racing already, though he’s moving nothing but his arm and hand, starting slow and methodical. 

At first, it’s not that different from every other time Kay has connected to the bionic. The information is there, interesting, but not as profound as he’d hoped it would be. And then… 

The patterns change, filled with new and intense streams of information. They’re nothing he can read, not yet, more like light and color than meaning, flooding through them both in a brilliant rush. 

Kay says in soft wonder, “Oh.”

Cassian slows his hand, his breathing fast and shallow and voice ragged with want. “Tell me that’s a good oh.”

“This is extremely pleasant,” Kay says. “I see why you like it.”

A little stuttery laugh bursts out of Cassian, jarring the bit, but Cassian can’t feel it and it only troubles Kay in that it disrupts the data flowing between them. “Can you feel what I feel? Interact with it?”

Kay considers that, and though he doesn’t think this is what Cassian meant, it gives him an idea. “I might be able to increase its intensity manually. May I try?”

“Uh, sure.” 

“Cassian.”

“Yes.” He says it firmly this time, game to experiment. He trusts Kay. Kay has to trust him in return, not to give something he doesn’t want.

There’s a soft whir and a click, then Kay’s fans pick up as he makes a few adjustments. Cassian gasps, jerking against Kay’s hands in an involuntary spasm. 

“Cassian?”

“Good– it’s good.” He can barely talk, but he grabs Kay’s hand and yanks it back to his lips to kiss, and then talking doesn’t matter. Nothing else matters as electrical pleasure rushes through Kay like the stars of hyperspace, a blinding blue-white blur that seizes every circuit, demanding more, seeking conclusion. 

Fuzzed and husky with static, Kay rasps, “Oh, that creates an extremely pleasant feedback loop–”

And Cassian’s body arches against Kay, who makes a rough, discordant sound as Cassian’s orgasm hits them both.

~~~

Cassian has had to get used to the fact that this relationship is never going to be anything like what he might have imagined for himself. Which is fine, really, because mostly he didn’t imagine, and when he did, usually his projections for his own future had ended with him dead somewhere. It remains that the few dreams he dared to have included a lot more turning his partner on, and a lot less focus on his own pleasure. 

Jyn says it’s good for him to let himself enjoy something, and she’s probably right, but he’s still breathtakingly grateful for what’s happening.

It doesn’t feels any different, at first. The slightly awkward sensation of the rigid bit in the small port in his lower back just like every other time Kay’s helped him with adjustments, only now with the added awkwardness of his arousal. At first, he focuses on their other points of contact.

Whatever Kay does changes everything, tapping directly into his nervous system, heightening his desire, and then his pleasure. The heady rush that follows is like nothing he’s ever experienced, every nerve in his body lit up with bliss of a magnitude he hadn’t known possible. 

He knows vaguely that he isn’t supposed to move, but it’s only gripping Kay’s hand and kissing it hard that keeps the rest of him still. Kay says something, the words meaningless static to his pleasure-soaked brain, but the rough discord in them enough to drive him over the edge.

Awash in afterglow, he manages to disentangle them, only so he can curl up in his lover’s steel embrace. Held, perfectly safe, safer than he’s ever been anywhere else in his life. Heat wicks off the metal against his skin. Kay’s own version of afterglow? Fans hum in a soft harmony of white noise, and Cassian has to blink to stay awake. 

“What… what’s it like?” He can’t help but be curious, in a clinical sort of way, what his pleasure feels like on the purely electrical level. He’d liked the idea of the bionic bringing him closer to Kay from the first time he’d mentioned it, but had never anticipated just how intimate it could allow them to be.

There’s a careful silence before Kay says, “I do not know how to describe it in your terms.” He strokes Cassian’s sweat-damp hair, and Cassian lets out a deep sigh. “I can say that it felt good, and that your pleasure is something I would like to study further, and that it is complex and beautiful, but I do not think those words do justice to what sharing pleasure with you feels like.”

The prickling warmth of a blush curls in Cassian’s stomach and heats his face. “You enjoyed it. That’s what matters.”

“Oh yes. I enjoyed it. Ninety-nine point nine percent.”

Cassian blinks up at him. “What is the point one percent?”

“The knowledge that I cannot share what it feels like to me, and you cannot share what it feels like to you.” Kay simulates a sigh almost as deep as Cassian’s. 

“That’s true of any two people,” Cassian assures him, softly. He curls his hand around two of Kay’s fingers and squeezes. He understands, now, and wants Kay to know it. “And I enjoyed it, too. I think it’s… exactly what I needed. You’re brilliant for thinking of it.” Bypassing his issues with being touched in certain places while allowing them a level of intimacy impossible to anyone else.

Something only they can share.

“I know.” There’s the smug preening; Kay loves being right. “I would like to do it again. I have experiments I want to run, to optimize the experience for both of us.”

Something dangerously like joy cracks open in Cassian’s chest, and he’s grinning and can’t stop. “I look forward to it. Whatever you did at the end…” A little shiver passes through him. He can still feel it, every nerve in his body bright and sensitive. His voice drops to a whisper. “Incredible.” 

If he’s not careful, he’s going to inflate Kay’s ego unbearably. But praising him when it’s due is worth it. 

“I’m glad you liked it,” Kay says, with so much humility Cassian knows he’s making diabolical plans for the future.

 _Their_ future.

**Author's Note:**

> This is the end of the Movement Recalibration story arc. Thank you to everyone who read from the beginning, and anyone new to this series now! Thank you to everyone who commented and kudo'd, you've made my first multi-part fic experience truly wonderful.


End file.
